Time For A Good Yarn To Make A Show Of It

The Age

Saturday September 20, 2008

Darren Gray, Rural Affairs Reporter

FOR some people it means crazy rides, fairy floss and a carload of showbags. But for the Grinter family, sheep breeders from the Riverina, in NSW, the Royal Melbourne Show is a shopfront.

When you breed prize-winning border Leicester sheep that are in demand across Australia, and even as far afield as the US and Kathmandu, the show is good for business.

It's a chance to compete, talk to customers, compare your sheep to those of other breeders and promote your brand. And so far the judges have been comparing the Grinters' woolly border Leicester sheep to others in the Livestock Pavilion very favourably.

Isabella and Graham Grinter have scooped 15 of the 17 classes they have entered so far with their rams and ewes.

Wearing matching bone-coloured trousers, blue shirts with "Retallack Border Leicester Stud" logos as well as wide-brimmed hats, the husband and wife combination probably deserve another award for presentation.

More sheep awards are to be decided, which means their 118.5-kilogram ram Dynasty is a chance to win the supreme champion sheep award at this year's Show. Along the way, Dynasty has already won two awards, for best woolly ram lamb, and supreme champion border Leicester.

To those unfamiliar with sheep, Dynasty might look like many other healthy, woolly sheep wandering around the paddock. But he's not. He's worth a small fortune, probably more than many new cars.

Not that there's any way the Grinters will ever part with a sheep that Mr Grinter says has a "big, big" future on the family's stud, about 120 kilometres north-west of Wagga Wagga.

While exhibiting sheep at the Adelaide Show a few years back, Mr Grinter got an inquiring phone call from someone wanting to buy Dynasty's great-grandfather.

"I knocked back $50,000 for a ram called the Boss," he says.

The continuing drought might have pushed prices down a little since then, and Mr Grinter's "no" might have cost him money in the short term, but Mrs Grinter believes it was the right decision, and one which will pay off in the long term.

TODAY'S HIGHLIGHTS

9.30am Cat judging, goat judging.

11am Novice cookery competition public judging (entries accepted until 10.30am today).

11am Animal wranglers demonstration.

11.30am Official Show opening on main arena with parade of Clydesdales.

Noon, 12.35, 12.50, 3.15, 3.30, 4, 4.45, 5.10, 5.25, 6, 6.15pm Woodchop finals.

12.30, 1.30, 2pm Dr Katrina Warren talks pets at the Wonderful World of Pets.

3pm Kung Fu Panda meet and greet.

1, 2, 3, 4pm Sheep shearing demonstration.

5.30pm Live band, Bjorn Again.

7.15pm Horses in action, World Cup Showjumping qualifier.

9pm Fireworks.

LINK

? royalshow.com.au/

© 2008 The Age

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